Selection
A selection contains a subset of gates, nets, and modules that are visible within the Graph View. A selection can be created using the mouse by left-clicking individual elements or dragging a rectangle around the desired components. It may also be expanded by pressing CTRL while selecting further netlist components. Detailed information on the selected elements can be found within the Selection Details Widget. The netlist component that has focus within that widget is highlighted in cyan within the Graph View while the remainder of the selection uses orange. A selection can easily be assigned to a grouping or module using the Selection Details Widget or the context menu that opens when right-clicking an element of the selection. HAL distinguishes between single- and multi-selections internally to facilitate advanced features to explore the netlist. Elements of the current selection can be retrieved from within Python using the dedicated GUI API.
If only a single gate, net, or module is selected, the user can navigate the netlist starting at the selected element using the arrow keys on the keyboard. With only a single gate or module being selected, the pins/ports of that gate/module are not highlighted using the selection color to indicate that the navigation feature is enabled and navigation towards the pins/ports is available. The navigation feature is further described here.
When selecting multiple netlist components, the pins/ports of gates/modules are highlighted using the respective selection color as well to indicate that the navigation feature described before is not currently available.
